THE INDIAN DREAMER

I have always had a problem with some aspects of the expansion of the universe. I don't deny the Big Bang theory. It's just that I like things to be simple. The farther objects are away, the faster they appear to be travelling. To account for this a glue called dark energy was theorised into existence. It all seems so messy, as glue usually is. An anti-gravitational force that allows things to travel faster than they should. It sounds like something out of pure imagination without any scientific proof.

Cosmologists in Spain have put forward a far better theory. One that postulates that time slows down and creates the illusion of acceleration. Objects at the far reaches of the universe have existed the longest and time has slowed down the most for them. Imagine myself running against the world's best racers. They can run 100 meters in less than 9.9 seconds. I would be lucky to do it in under 12 seconds. However, if I were to run 100 metres with a clock that ran slower than normal then when I finished the race it might read 9.7 seconds. Therefore I had accelerated up to a speed that was apparently faster than the race champions who used a "normal" clock. It is the possibility of clocks running at different speeds that gives rise to this new theory.

We already accept clocks running at different speeds when discussing relativity and black holes. There is no problem with time slowing down. Time is not constant and depends upon the state of the observer. I have been on this planet for 20 years, an off-earth viewer, far away with a faster running clock, might see me living a lot longer than I have. It's just that on this planet tick follows tock at a certain rate and we imagine it do so everywhere in the universe.